Rebuilding: The Tale of the Sinnoh League
by Polarissb
Summary: The Four Cataclysms brought devastation…and pokémon. Ezra taught history most of his life, but now it's time to write a new chapter. Bertha's no stranger to roughing it, but foxes didn't breathe fire before. Fantina's always wanted to be more than a model, and now her chance is here. In a brand new world, pokémon are the only way to rebuild and forge peace. 50 years before D/P.
1. Prologue: The Four Cataclysms

_The world as we knew it vanished during the Four Cataclysms. First came the war; North Korea made good on its threats and launched a missile at the US. Global panic ensued, and when the smoke cleared, the best thing that could be said was that there would be no nuclear winter. The US and much of Asia were burning holes, and here and there nuclear strikes pockmarked the rest of the globe._

 _Just as the world was catching its breath, Earth itself hit back. In what would come to be called the Rift Cataclysm, battered tectonic plates worldwide came loose in a chain reaction of civilization-shattering earthquakes and the fault lines were opened to the sky._

 _The rifts proved to be the world's salvation, as the wounded Earth released waves of what could only be described as pure life force through its cracks. Animals and plants, and humans who strayed too near the rifts became…something else. Something powerful. As humanity came to understand the new 'pokémon,' they found the key to survival without a global industry. Pokémon made for more than pets; they were strong, helpful…and in the wrong hands, weapons._

 _Some saw the devastation as the judgement of God. Others said the Earth had simply had too much and was failing. A few saw pokémon as a sign that humanity had done enough damage - that our time was over. They banded together and took the name "Vengeant Earth," as well as the title of "Team" that has come to be synonymous with organized crime across modern history. Team Vengeant, as they quickly became known, embraced the power that was creating pokemon, establishing a base that straddled the point near the Black Sea where the African, Eurasian, and Arabian plates meet. From this powerful point they harvested the energy to build an Ultimate Weapon that would wipe out every human left in a burst of cleansing destruction._

 _Fortunately for us, they were thwarted, but not before the Middle East became another scar on the world. In the years that followed, pokémon and their energy brought new advances in science and medicine and it seemed like we might finally have a chance to put things back together._

 _Hubris._

 _Remnants of Team Vengeant attached artificially created pokémon, the ones called 'magnemite,' to an exploratory space mission that might have led to mining asteroids for resources. Once away from earth, the magnet pokémon hijacked the rocket and used it to nudge an asteroid onto a collision course with Earth as the world watched in horror._

 _In the months leading to the impact, the world organized more than it had in over a decade. Pokémon were the only hope left, and bases and groups worldwide coordinated to carefully generate a counter shockwave as the asteroid hit North America. An extinction-level event was prevented, but the destruction was again catastrophic. When the crater became safe to explore, we found that it contained pokémon stronger than any documented so far, which eventually gained the title "legendaries." As they awakened, many of the legendary pokemon spread out and began a rampage that strained civilization to the limit, further reshaping the landscape and cutting off global communications and what remained of trade. Eventually most of them went dormant or vanished._

 _That was almost fifteen years ago. We're still holding our breath and hoping we won't have a fifth Cataclysm to add to the list, but things are quiet. Now it's a matter of rebuilding. Governments still exist, more or less, but in reality they're a joke. The real power comes from pokémon. What are guns worth when they don't do more than annoy half the species around, and when a few people can carry an army in their pockets? No, government pales in comparison to the gangs, or "teams" as they like to call themselves, who roam the region and terrorize wherever they see something to take._

 _It's high time we took matters into our own hands._

 _This is the tale of the Sinnoh League._


	2. Chapter 1

**36 years post-Rift Cataclysm**

 **47 years before the Spear Pillar crisis**

"Lairon, pin it down. But…be gentle." While the armored pokémon held down a struggling staravia, Ezra crossed his arms and started lecturing the garishly blue-haired thug in front of him. "You treat that animal like crap, son. If I was it I wouldn't do a damn thing you said. You don't deserve them."

He changed topics. "The world's been through hell. The last thing people need is gangs like yours coming in and trying to lord it over peaceful towns that are just trying to get along. Do you know what the Oreburgh Mine means around here? It means heat in the winter. It means we can refine the iron coming out of the islands. It means we've got a chance of putting industry back together so we're not relying on wood and a few toys from Canada to keep civilization together. Pokémon are the one good thing to come out of the last thirty years, and you and your cronies treat 'em like dirt."

The boy—he couldn't have been more than sixteen—glared back. "Listen, mister, don't get all high and mighty with me. You probably got a home and family and such. We don't have _anything_ unless we take it."

"That what you really think?" Ezra retorted. "People all over the place looking for help and all you can think of is taking what little they have? Your problem isn't what you don't have, it's what you don't give a damn about."

He turned to the bird his lairon had on the ground. "What about you there? You understand me?" The staravia cocked its head at him. "Do _you_ want to stick around here? You can come with us if you want."

"You can't have her." There was a flash and the staravia vanished into a ball.

Ezra shook his head. "You don't get it, do you, son? You could actually do some good in the world if you weren't so selfish." He was going to say more, but cut off as the ground rumbled, knocking the boy off his feet. A woman with red-hair and rough knee-length boots came toward them at a brisk walk with a bat-winged gliscor hovering alongside.

"Ezra, was that your name? I asked you to help, not talk their ears off." Crossing to the fallen thug, she pulled out a rope and tied his hands together behind his back. "You won't get anywhere with this lot."

The man sighed. "I'm a teacher, Bertha. This is what I used to _do_ , they all ought to have a chance to fix things. God knows we need all the help we can get."

"Yeah, _because_ of them." She relieved the protesting boy of the gray-and-white ball and tossed it to Ezra. "Here. I've already got one."

"I don't need one of these," Ezra said, catching it automatically and staring at the device in his hands. "Lairon and I get along just fine without 'em."

"Keep it anyway. Could come in handy sometime, and I'm sure you'll put it to better use than he did."

Ezra hesitated for another moment and shrugged. "Fine." A thought struck him and he pressed the button, letting the staravia back out in a red-tinged flash. "You're not going to need this anymore, you're free to go." The bird pokémon still seemed a little weak, but hopped across the rocks and out of the mine. Ezra nodded in its direction and headed out himself, Lairon ambling along next to him. The man reached under the armored plate on its head, scratching at the leathery skin beneath. Lairon rumbled with pleasure. "You don't need this thing, do you? Didn't think so." He shrugged to himself and shoved the ball into his canvas pack. A voice from behind made him pause.

"Hey. Ezra." It was the red-haired woman, Bertha, again. "We're gonna try and break up the Red Claw gang over in Jubilife here soon. Can we count on you again?"

He sighed, running a hand through his black hair. The Rock Bosses had been easy to bring down; just a few belligerent young men trying to tell people what they could and couldn't do with the mine. The Red Claw gang, or "team" as they'd styled themselves, had an iron grip on the most developed town in the area. There were more of them, they were organized, and they were known to pit their pokémon against one another to make them stronger.

 _How did I get mixed up in this?_ Ezra asked himself again. He'd been an average high school teacher when war had come and gone, and as the world fell apart he'd found a friendly iron-shelled armadillo thing and taken it in. Lairon had been with him ever since, and had been a good protector even if he'd been smaller back then. Ezra didn't really understand how, but pokémon changed sometimes—that was just a fact of life now.

In the end, it came down to one thing: The world was different now. Police and governments were largely a thing of the past. He had a wife and a little boy, Byron, who needed a safe world to grow up in. Ezra would say yes for the same reason he'd agreed to come here: _If we're going to fix things, we have to do it on our own_.


End file.
